SMU head coach Chad Morris spoke to the media after SMU's victory over Liberty on Saturday night. Here are some highlights:

On his overall thoughts on the win:

"I want to talk about being 1-0 tonight. That was our goal as a team to come in and win tonight. It doesn't matter what's happened before us. It doesn't really matter what's going to happen after. It was could we come in here tonight and be 1-0 as a team and a group. We achieved that tonight. Hats off to Liberty and Coach (Turner) Gill. We knew we were going to get their absolute best tonight. They played some very tough teams. Virginia Tech, they played them down to the wire. We knew we were going to get their absolute best."

On Ben Hicks:

Mustangs find a way to win ... using a method their fans seldom see

"Ben doesn't struggle with confidence. He has great confidence in his game. He was struggling throwing a spiral tonight. I don't know what it was. He wasn't as in sync as he's been in the past. Courtland (Sutton) dropped a ball down the middle of the field where he would have scored. When you're a quarterback and you coach quarterbacks, it's all about confidence. When a guy gets out of rhythm and throws a couple of picks, we have to find a way to get him back his confidence. Whether that's short throws or whatever that may be, we have to be able to do a good job of that."

On Braeden West:

"The highlight offensively tonight was obviously Braeden West. He had 200 yards rushing -- the fifth highest rushing output by a running back in school history. And there have been some great ones to come out of here. Over 200 yards rushing, it was great to see Braeden West (accomplish that). We needed that. I still feel like we could have gotten more, but I was really proud of those guys that rushed for 286 yards."

On the rest of the offense's struggles:

"We're playing good between the 20s and moving the football. But we have to find a way to put the football in the red zone. And that's been a problem. You are playing a lot of young guys on both sides of the ball, so you know you're going to continue to get better. But we're making too many mistakes in the red zone. We're throwing interceptions and causing turnovers. Those are things you have to get better at. You can't win big ball games by turning the ball over in the red zone."

On the defense's performance:

"I am very impressed with the way that we are playing defensively. This is three weeks in a row that our defense has played really well. We are creating turnovers."